About Rebalance

History of Rebalance –

Rebalance LLC is a small business based in Wenatchee, Washington, formed in 2011 by Emily Orling and David Elwood. David is an engineer by training and Emily is a botanist and fire ecologist. They met at Oregon State University in 2007 while David was completing his graduate research in direct-drive wave energy conversion technologies and Emily was managing a research lab studying aphid-plant interactions. Their love of science and a desire to create a more sustainable society is the core philosophy of Rebalance LLC.

Rebalance Energy, established in 2019 and led by CTO David Elwood, focuses on the development of renewable energy and energy storage technologies and projects in Western North America. Rebalance Environmental Consulting, led by CEO Emily Orling, was formed in 2013 to provide environmental science consulting services to government agencies and non-profit organizations and went dormant in 2019 when Emily accepted a job with the US Bureau of Reclamation working on the Columbia Basin Irrigation Project.

Rebalance Energy –

At Rebalance, we believe that the World needs to let go of old paradigms in order to change the way energy is produced and stored. The standard utility business models with central stations and thousands of miles of wire were developed based on the constraints of 20th century technologies and markets. We’re looking to develop new technologies and projects by thinking, and building, outside the box of traditional utilities.

Our team has extensive experience with hydroelectric projects designed to leverage existing water infrastructure to minimize environmental impacts and costs of new electrical generation. This can take the form of refurbishment and upgrade of aging turbine-generator units or the development of new projects on existing conduits and storage reservoirs. We have worked with asset owners to develop innovative partnerships and design cost effective and efficient projects that create new revenue streams while minimizing impacts to existing users of the infrastructure and the environment.

Based on our experience developing sustainable hydroelectric projects we believe the best approach for building new energy storage technologies and projects will be to leverage existing infrastructure and proven technologies. With this approach in mind Rebalance Energy is currently looking for opportunities to partner with existing water and electrical utilities along with the agricultural, forestry, and petrochemical industries to develop innovative energy storage technologies.

The Team

David Elwood, PE began his career in 2001 as a Naval Architect and Marine Engineer working for the US Navy. His time with the Navy taught him the interconnection between quality and safety working within the SUBSAFE QA/QC program at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard. It also taught him how to think outside the box during his time at NAVSEA Carderock working in a High Speed Sealift Inovation Cell.

David completed a graduate program in engineering at Oregon State University focusing on wave energy technologies at the Wallace Energy Systems and Renewables Facility. He helped to design and build the first wave energy conversion system to generate electricity off the Coast of Oregon in 2008, the C-Power Blue Ray L10 linear generator.

Since 2008 David has worked as a mechanical and marine engineer in the conventional hydroelectric, wave, and tidal energy industries. His work has ranged from development of <1MW greenfield hydroelectric projects in remote Alaska to the repair and upgrade of large hydro turbine-generators.

From 2014 to 2019 he was the field engineering lead and project manager for a $20 Million per year capital project to rebuild the electro-mechanical equipment at the 840 MW Wells Hydroelectric Project on the Columbia River near Wenatchee, WA. In his five years at Wells David helped reduce the outage duration for rebuild of a turbine-generator unit from 55 months on the first machine, completed in 2013, to 18 months on the third unit.